How an MP’s lies unravelled in front of Parliament

At 8.26am on November 18 — the day Barry Urban’s fake medal scandal hit The West Australian’s front page — acting premier Roger Cook sent someone a text message.

“What’s the strategy on Barry Urban?” it read.

A reply came exactly 41 minutes later. But the entire contents of the response — and the author’s identity — have been blacked out as part of the hit-and-miss freedom of information process.

But enough documents were released to show the thought processes of the Premier’s closest advisers as the McGowan Government came under mounting pressure.

In a nutshell, the messaging being prepared by flak-catchers on the day the story broke centred on Mr Urban’s “mistake”.

“For Mr Urban’s complex case, it’s not about whether or not he should be wearing a medal,” was one of the “approved lines” for ministers.

“It’s about the particular medal itself that he mistook for one he should have held. It’s pleasing to see Mr Urban has corrected the record and is being accountable — taking action to remedy the mistake.”

The approved lines failed to address how Mr Urban had lied by telling The West Australian he’d been sent the “wrong medal” by the British police and his claim of writing to authorities in Britain to discover why this had occurred was a fabrication.

Camera IconBarry UrbanPicture: Barry Urban MLA/Facebook

The member for Darling Range had actually bought the wrong medal from a Perth shop and it was never awarded to him.

When Mr Urban issued a statement on November 18, about his “mistake”, Mark McGowan’s senior advisers were pleased and “tempered” their planned comments on behalf of the Premier.

It was decided that any “expectation of dramatic action by MM” was now reduced.

Rather than grasp the gravity of the Labor MP’s deception, the Premier’s senior staff worked on a strategy to help Mr Urban’s so-called mistake appear plausible.

Camera IconBarry Urban medalsPicture: Barry Urban MLA/Facebook

On the day the Urban story broke, a media adviser to the Premier sent a list of questions to a colleague in the office of Veterans Issues Minister Peter Tinley.

Lannie Le-Patterson wanted to know all the ins-and-outs of “decorative medals”.

“The responses to the below questions will help us inform how we manage queries and craft comms (communications) around the Barry Urban medal incident,” she wrote.

As ministers were being told to refer to the Urban matter as “regrettable and unintentional”, the Premier had arrived back in Perth.

“Welcome back,” his chief of staff Guy Houston said in a text on November 20.

“I also SMS on your other phone, but it would pay to call Barry Urban this morning in the car on your way to office. Call me before you do, if you can.”

Later that day, the Premier had a brief text exchange with Mr Houston.

“Spoke to Barry again,” Mr McGowan said.

“And he still maintains he served in the Balkans?” the chief of staff responded.

“Yes,” the Premier said.

The MP is still being paid $160,000 a year in tax payers' money.

The West Australian

VideoThe MP is still being paid $160,000 a year in tax payers' money.

In the meantime, the Premier’s strategic adviser Mark Reed was busy trying to shore up the MP’s life story and academic qualifications. He emailed police authorities in Britain on November 22.

“Mr Urban asserts that while a police officer in the West Midlands, he was deployed to Bosnia to assist in the investigation of war crimes,” Mr Reed wrote.

“Unfortunately, while we have evidence he was a police officer in West Midlands at the time, Mr Urban has failed to provide any evidence that he was deployed to Bosnia.”

He wrote that without evidence “the intense scrutiny of his resume and career will continue.” Mr Reed was right.

If Mr Urban was never in Bosnia, then wearing the medal was much more than a mistake.

Over the next 24 hours, the Premier’s office was continually asked for any updates on Mr Urban’s bona fides and conceded that it didn’t have “anything back yet that puts the issue to bed”.

Mr McGowan’s principal policy adviser Dave Coggin was being asked how to respond to emails to the Premier’s office about the Urban issue, and on November 24, office manager Nadeen Roberts sent an email to Mr Reed with a dramatically titled attachment. “Leaks; catastrophe — a crisis with a bad outcome; Barry URBAN.”

The contents of the attachment were considered outside the ambit of the FOI.